Top all-time · #528
Paul Falstad
Personal blog · falstad.comsciencehardwaregames
Paul Falstad's personal blog at falstad.com covers science, hardware and games. Since 2009, 112 different Hacker News readers have linked it 151 times, most often “Electronic Circuit Simulator in the Browser”. No feed was found, so read it on the site itself.
Often recommended · 18 of 40 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Paul Falstad's browser simulators, especially the circuit simulator, for learning electronics and physics and for checking circuit designs.
- Recommended for · 18 comments
- Called "amazing", "great" and "my favorite"; said to help students learn circuits and to be fast enough for work.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 40 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- Electronic Circuit Simulator in the Browser19 people · 21 mentions · first linked 2018-07-24
- Electronic circuit simulator that runs in the browser19 people · 19 mentions · first linked 2010-09-17
- Circuit Simulator Applet15 people · 19 mentions · first linked 2018-07-29
- Circuit Simulator6 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2022-01-30
- Math, Physics, and Engineering Applets5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2009-10-30
- Original Pong did not have any code or even a microprocessor4 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2022-05-25
- /circuit/4 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2009-11-14
- Ripple Stimulation4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2014-05-30
- Pong Circuit-Level Simulation3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-09-02
- Evidently teaching physics is hard2 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2010-03-26
What Hacker News says?
You might have inspired me to give it a retry! I remembered the name, but wasn't sure enough to recommend it to someone new. Apparently there are browser-based options too. https://www.circuitlab.com/ https://www.falstad.com/circuit/
Comment linking /circuit/
on “My Business Card Runs Linux”Submitted Original Pong did not have any code or even a microprocessor as a story · 572 points
HN discussionI started with EEVBlog, especially "Fundamentals Friday" and the series where he designs things. Next, I turned to the textbook at AllAboutCircuits. Next thing I did was design and build a DC lab. I bought my meters and scopes outright, but designed and built my own DC load and power supply. Since I'd already watched Dave's videos about them on EEVBlog, they were obviously influenced by his design, but I made a coup…
Comment linking /circuit/
on “Ask HN: How to self-learn electronics?”Submitted Electronic Circuit Simulator in the Browser as a story · 534 points
HN discussionhttp://www.falstad.com/circuit/ It used to be a Java applet, now rewritten in JavaScript. Sadly, the Java version vastly outperforms the JS one, at least on my machine, but Java applets are annoying to run nowadays
Comment linking /circuit/
on “Ask HN: How to self-learn electronics?”Submitted Pong Circuit-Level Simulation as a story · 189 points
HN discussionAs someone with a hardware background, I'll throw in my $0.02. The schematic capture elements to connect up large blocks of HDL with a ton of I/O going everywhere are one of the few applications of visual programming that I like. Once you get past defining the block behaviors in HDL, instantiation can become tedious and error-prone in text, since the tools all kinda suck with very little hinting or argument checking…
Comment linking /circuit/
on “We need visual programming. No, not like that”Submitted Math, Physics, and Engineering Applets as a story · 133 points
HN discussionFor me the 'aha' moment was the microcode section of the 8-bit computer project. Just the physical understanding of how it can take a different number of clock cycles to execute an 'instruction' - and how (in this architecture) every instruction cycle has to start with the memory address switching to the current program counter, and the data from that address being loaded into a register. I haven't gone as far as ac…
Comment linking /circuit/circuitjs.html
on “From Nand to Tetris (2017)”Submitted Evidently teaching physics is hard as a story · 35 points
HN discussionI was wondering why the website was grayed out! Falstad has an amazing circuit simulator. https://www.falstad.com/circuit/circuitjs.html Lotta fun to learn how circuits work and make some basic projects :)
Comment linking /circuit/circuitjs.html
on “Original Pong did not have any code or even a microprocessor”Submitted Simulated circuit level breakdown of 1972 Atair Pong as a story · 32 points
HN discussionFalstad Circuit Simulator - https://falstad.com/circuit/
Comment linking /circuit/
on “Original Pong did not have any code or even a microprocessor”Submitted Circuit Level Simulation of Pong as a story · 16 points
HN discussionYes, you can install the java version on your local machine. http://www.falstad.com/circuit-java/ I've done this in the past and it works just fine.
Comment linking /circuit-java/
on “Electronic Circuit Simulator in the Browser”Submitted Dipping your fingers in molten lead [pdf] as a story · 14 points
HN discussionI second this view with this old full circuit simulator: https://www.falstad.com/circuit/ The default example here is the LCR-circuit which to understand mathematically requires a bit of work https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RLC_circuit
Comment linking /circuit/
on “Ask HN: What are some good resources to learn how electricity works?”Submitted Paul Falstad's Math and Physics Applets as a story · 8 points
HN discussionLet me see if I can do a defense that doesnt merely look like an obvious backpedal. If you want to do a standard study in physics you are probably going to go through a significant amount of mathematics. This is because the laws "universe at the most fundamental level/low level" are expressed as math equations. If OP wants to go that route then there are tons of resources available to them. But since OP already has…
Comment linking /gas/
on “Ask HN: How to self-study physics?”Submitted Electronic circuit simulator that runs in the browser as a story · 4 points
HN discussionhttps://falstad.com Allows you to simulate electronic circuits and also has bunch of other tools.
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: What's the coolest website you know?”Submitted Astable Multivibrator (Oscillator) as a story · 3 points
HN discussionhttps://falstad.com/circuit/
Comment linking /circuit/
on “Ask HN: What's the coolest website you know?”Submitted Math and Physics Visualizations as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThis animated circuit simulation can help students conceptually understand what is happening in the circuits they learn about in the first 2-3 college circuit courses: http://falstad.com/circuit/ (it's a java applet, but it was ported to ios/android with the icircuit app) I tutored students with a modified version of this simulation and they learned in less than a half hour stuff they hadn't learned after 2 circuit…
Comment linking /circuit/
on “All About Circuits”Submitted A Visual Comparison of Various Distances as a story · 3 points
HN discussionAs far as physics simulations go, this is my favorite treasure trove: http://www.falstad.com/mathphysics.html Ripple Tank and Analog Circuit Simulator are my favs. I could play for days.
Comment linking /mathphysics.html
on “High school physics course notes, with JavaScript simulations”Submitted Falstad Math and Physics Simulations as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThe only applet I know of outside the early few years of hype that still works and does something useful is Falstad's circuit simulator. https://www.falstad.com/circuit/
Comment linking /circuit/
on “Java 16”Submitted Math, Physics, and Engineering Applets as a story · 2 points
HN discussion
